Valley Voices Spring 2015 is a special issue on Michael Anania, guest edited by Michael Antonucci and Garin Cycholl, who write, “Anania’s space is the river, the imagined city – a Chicago of relentless modernity, one capable of reinventing itself and making itself for sale again and again as the waters rise and fall. From here, the poet observes and reflects on this Chicago on the make – a sprawl of fresh water and wind, candy and steel.”

Featured in the volume is an interview with Anania as well as several of his poems. Also included are essays on Anania’s work: “Modernist Current: Michael Anania’s Poetry of the Western Rivers” by Robert Archambeau; “‘Out of Dazzlement’…Chiaroscuro Revisited” by Peter Michaelson; “‘Energy Held in Elegant Control’: Vortex Anania” by Lachlan Murray; “Another Italian-American Poet in Omaha: Italy in Michael Anania’s Poetry” by William Allegrezza; “Michael Anania’s The Red Menace: A Study in Self-Production” by David Ray Vance; “‘Like Hands Raised in Song’: Proper Names in Michael Anania’s ‘Steal Away'” by Lea Graham; “On Michael Anania’s In Natural Light” by Reginald Gibbons as well as several more.

“This collection of essays and original work,” the editors write, “offers a set of moments in lands (and waters) surveyed by Anania. That land pretends a relentless modernity – one that Anania has evidenced for readers, colleagues, and other artists page by page, line by line. Charles Olson argued that the poet either rides on or digs into the land. This collection of essays and Anania’s writings attest that he has done both.”

Well, this is a first for me in all the years I’ve been working with literary magazines. The July/August 2016 cover of Poetry is a special treat for those who can access the print version. Artist Chris Hefner has created a glow-in-the-dark moon to celebrate the “moon poems” by Federico García Lorca, translated by Sarah Arvio. The issue features “Two Evening Moons,” “Of the Dark Doves,” and “Ballad of the Moon Moon.” Read more about the translations as well as a statement from the artist about his work and several other images from his collection here.

Issue #97 of Brick, writes Publisher Nadia Szilvassy, if it had a theme, would be “bittersweet,” as it pays tribute to the life and work of two of the magazines “longtime contributors and dear friends, C. D. Wright and Jim Harrison.” The issue is also the last for Szilvassy as publisher. After over nine years with the magazine, she leaves Editor Laurie D. Graham, Managing Editor Liz Johnston and Designer Mark Byk to steer the publication. “You will…” Szilvassy promises, “find yourselves newly inspiried and delighted.” Farewell Nadia. Our best to you.

This week marks the eight-year anniversary of online literary magazine The Write Place at the Write Time, founded July 3^rd 2008. In those eight years, the journal has been read in 80 countries, and the editors have published 29 issues with over 338 contributors of ranging ages, cultures, and publication credits. More than producing a literary magazine, the editors have also organized projects throughout the years, such as a Filmed Poetry Reading, a Pay-It-Forward Initiative, a Twitter Tales experiment where a group of writers created a story via tweets, and more.

To celebrate the anniversary, check out the Spring/Summer 2016 issue, which includes new fiction, poetry, nonfiction, and art, with an anniversary scrapbook that looks back at past anniversaries. The Writers Craft Box features an opportunity for writers to explore the significance of numbers for a prize, and in interviews, Tracy Chevalier, author of Girl with a Pearl Earring, discusses her latest novel, At the Edge of the Orchard, as well as the themes found in her work.

Happy anniversary, The Write Place at the Write Time. We at NewPages wish you many more years to come.

The newest issue of Southern Humaniites Review (v49 n2) includes a special poetry section of selections from Of River, a chapbook edited by Chiyuma Elliot and Katie Peterson, who also each contribute a piece.The entire chapbook is available to read for free online here. The editors open the collection with this explanation:

We began with Langston Hughes’s 1921 award-winning poem “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” and the charge to write something in response. There was something in the invitation about nature poetry and how that seemed important, but otherwise the instructions were open-ended (perhaps scarily so). We asked poets of very different styles and sensibilities, only some of whom were already engaged with Hughes’s work: F. Douglas Brown, Jericho Brown, Katie Ford, Rachel Eliza Griffiths, Derrick Harriell, Dong Li, Sandra Lim, and Michael C. Peterson. We wanted to see what each of these writers would make. In both the individual poems and the group as a whole, we weren’t disappointed; the poems ask, reach, and posit literary relationship in phenomenally different ways.

The Louisville Review accepts submissions from students in grades K-12 to feature in “The Children’s Corner” section of the journal. In the Spring 2016 issue, four young writers were published:

Kate Busatto, “The Communion”

Kiran Damodaran, “Collision Theory”

Andrew D. Swann, “Jelly Dreams,” “God Didn’t Make the World Round,” and “Worn and Broken”

Isabel Young, “Our Romance is Kamikaze:”

Get a copy of The Louisville Review to check out these new writers.

The June 2016 issue of Poetry features cover art by Anna Maria Maiolino. On Harriet: The Blog, Fred Sasaki provides more information about this artist who, it turns out, also creates visual and written poetry with all her works considered to be “poetic actions.”

Maiolino speaks about her series Photopoemaction, from which the June 2016 cover art comes:

“The photographic series Fotopoemação is a result of the elaboration of images that emerged from my written poems. [ . . . ] These series, other than constituting a challenge to the poetic labour, are efficient instruments of both innovation and freedom. They result from thinking about the things of the world, from the attempt to transform what we live through into consciousness in a poetic operational movement of conduct.”

Check out the full blog post to read more, or stop by the Poetry webpage to listen to this month’s podcast and check out the work inside the June 2016 issue.

Concho River Review recently launched their Spring 2016 issue which marks the beginning of their 30^th year of publication. With the first issue released in the spring of 1987, founder Terry Dalrymple expected the journal to last for only five years. Now, he estimates CRR has published around 7000 pages throughout the years with 250 pieces of fiction, 900 poems, 200 pieces of nonfiction, and 300 book reviews. Whew!

Happy anniversary, Concho River Review. We hope to see you around for many more years (and pages).

Agni Online offers free access to fiction, poetry and essays as an extension of their print publication. These contributions are offered exclusively online, and recent works include “Pinays” an essay by Ricco Villanueva Siasoco; “Seam Ripper” flash fiction by Kathryn Hill; “I Fell Asleep Among the Horses” poem by Kathryn Starbuck; “One Hundred Years of Solitude, or The Importance of a Story” an essay by Oksana Zabuzhko; “Sibboleth” an essay by Dan Beachy-Quick; “First Boyfriend” a poem by Chase Twichell; and “Jury Duty” a story by William Virgil Davis.

Issue number 11 of The Common is co-edited by Acker and prominent Jordanian author Hisham Bustani is titled “Tajdeed: Contemporary Arabic Fiction.” The publication features the work of 31 contributors from 15 Middle Eastern countries: Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen all translated for contemporary English-speaking audiences.

Teachers: The Common in the Classroom provides a way to introduce your students to global literature. Students recieve a discounted subscription price (2 issues) and you recieve a desk copy and sample lesson plans along with an in-person or Skype visit from Editor in Chief Jennifer Acker, or one of the publications participating authors.

Monica Canilao’s art is featured on the cover of The Carlolina Quarterly Summer 2016 issue, and even though is only a section of a larger work, I was struck immediately by the image. Canilao is an artist who describes her work as “stitching, painting, printing, and breathing life into the refuse that dominates our time and place.” The Carolina Quarterly provides Canilao 16 full-color pages in addition to the artist’s introduction, in which she writes: “My art practice is a way to generate a personal and living history. My community and collaborators, my roots and their neraly lost traditions, my neighborhood and its trash piles are all integral, necessay parts of my life and art.” A quick internet search of Monica Canilao provides a wealth of images of her work, from the canvas to murals in city buildings, installations within building spaces, and into the desert. Originally from Califormia but spending time in Detroit, Michigan, I was pleased with this introduciton to her work; I hope to see more of it in the future – perhaps even in real life.

Image: Slab City desert, part of a collaborative project with photographer Aaron Huey for the forthcoming book Shelter. The home Canilao built also doubled as a set for a short film called Bring Water, in which she played a role.

In addition to the open poetry contributions, Rattle #52 features a tribute to 21 Los Angeles poets, and an interview with L.A. native-born poet Brendan Constantine, author of collections Letters to Guns (2009), Birthday Girl With Possum (2011), and Calamity Joe (2012).

Rattle editors write, “Los Angeles is our home city, but we’re an international magazine and not especially sociable, so we wanted to peek in and see what’s happening in the local scene. Greater Los Angeles is home to almost 20 million people, including a very eclectic but widely dispersed poetry community: Take your pick of the many poetry readings and open mics happening daily—but good luck driving there! It’s also a city full of complicated history and cinematic beauty. As always, we put out an open call for submissions, and were impressed with what Angeleno poets had to offer, including a love poem for Los Angeles by L.A. Poet Laureate Luis J. Rodriguez.”

Other Angelenos featured inclue: Resa Alboher, Allan Aquino, Chanel Brenner, Brendan Constantine, Jack Cooper, Alejandro Escudé, Alexis Rhone Fancher, Alan Fox, Jack Grapes, Ron Koertge, Deborah P. Kolodji, Lester Graves Lennon, Ruth Madievsky, Risa Potters, Raquel Reyes-Lopez, Lynne Thompson, Amy Uyematsu, Charles Harper Webb, Mari Werner, and Cecelia Woloch.

The Spring 2016 issue of Michigan Quarterly Review provides witness to the travesty of the water crisis in Flint, Michigan – only a stone’s throw from MQR’s home in Ann Arbor. Jonathan Freedman addresses the issue using Michigan’s state promotional campaign slogan “Pure Michigan” – aptly titling his editorial “Impure Michigan.”

Like many who respond to this man-made disaster, Freedman points the blame directly as it should be: “The real impurity, then, extends from the polluted water to the polluted political system that allowed emergency managers to run cities without being answerable to them, to the cover-their-ass bureaucracy, to the governor who reverses Harry Truman’s credo by whining that the buck stops everywhere but his desk. The real impurity is the stupidity, selfishness and racism that is structural to the politcal system in this and far too many states.”

Included in the issue is “Flint and Beyond,” a special section on the Flint water crisis: Flint native Kelsey Ronan explores the effect on her family in “Blood and Water,” Tarfia Faizullah dedicates her poem “I Told the Water” to Flint, fiction by Matthew Baker, “Pheasants of Detroit,” and Jack Driscoll, “Calcheck and Priest” look at life in Michigan today.

Crab Fat Magazine, the online literary magazine featuring feminist/queer work with a flair for the experimental, has made a few changes lately. Instead of publishing quarterly PDF issues, Crab Fat will now publish monthly online HTML issues (with the past PDF issues still archived and available online). Issue 8, published May 22, is the introduction to this new format. An annual “best of” print anthology will also be produced with the 2015 edition set to release later this month.

The spring/summer 2016 issue of Alaska Quarterly Review includes the special feature “Sparks: A Conversation in Poems and Paintings” with Poet Peggy Shumaker [pictured] and Artist Kes Woodward.

From the Introduction: “This collaboration began when two friends decided to share an artistic conversation. Kes Woodward asked Peggy Shumaker to write a poem, and he created a painting in response to it. Peggy wrote in response, Kes painted in response, again and again. As each piece added its vividness to the conversation, both writer and artist found they were responding not just to the last piece, bu to the entire body of work. The work has taken many unpredictable and startling turns, adding to the intensity of this third art – an art that’s not language alone, not purely painting, but the bonding of the two.”

Poet Lore Spring/Summer 2016 features Jesse Lee Kercheval’s translation of Uruguay poet Idea Vilariño. In her introduction, Kercheval writes of Vilariño’s book-length work, Poem de amor, “her own Leave of Grass. . . stands as a testament to both the necessity and the impossibility of love in this world, especially for a passionate, independent woman determined to speak with her own voice.” Kercheval adds, “I believe it is important for English-speaking poets and poetry readers in general to have access to work, and am delighted to this selection of poems – in both Spanish and English – in Poet Lore. I hope all of Poemas de amor will soon be available in translation.” Several of the works are available in English on the Poet Lore website. A Guest begins:

You’re not mine
you’re not here
in my life
at my side
you don’t eat at my table
or laugh or sing
or live for me.

Chinua Achebe fans: You’re going to want the newest issue of The Massachusetts Review (v.LVII, n.1; Spring 2016) “A Gathering in Honor of Chinua Achebe” on the front cover doesn’t quite convey the powerhouse of essays included within. The editor’s note gives more specific context: “In our Spring issue the Massachusetts Review is honored to feature the contributions to a recent symposium held at the University of Massachusetts Amherst on October 14 and 15, 2015. ‘Forty Years After: Chinua Achebe and Africa in the Global Imagination’ was hosted by the university’s Interdisciplinary Studies Institute . . .” and included physician-executive Dr. Chidi Achebe (third son of Chinua and Christie Achebe), Johnnetta Betsch Cole, Ekwueme Michael Thelwell, Denja Abdullahi, Jule Chametzky, Caryl Phillips, Okey Ndibe, Chika Unigwe, Chuma Nwokolo, Maaza Mengiste, and Achille Mbembe. Each of their contributions are included in this issue along with the originating essay, “An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad’s Heart of Darkness” by Chinua Achebe.

The Spring 2016 issue of Rumninate Magazine celebrates ten years of publication! The volume features comments from readers, staff, and contributors who share their experience with “ruminating and contemplation – being still and attentive, pausing and listening.” The cover art, “Rhino” by Nicholas Price, actually appeared on the very first cover of Ruminate. Editor Brianna VanDyke says it is featured again as “a playful nod to our roots and the beautiful and gusty perserverances of a little arts magazine celebrating ten years.” And, in gratitude to their readership, tucked into each anniversary issue of Rhino is a gorgeous letterpress broadside which reads, “Always We Begin Again” – After St. Benedict. What a treat Ruminate has been for the past decade, and we all hope for many more to come!

I normally try to focus my blog notes on one “something” per lit mag per post, but the newest issue of The Georgia Review has several somethings worth note. First, congratulations to the Review for achieving 70 years of continuous quarterly publication! Congratulations to Emily Van Kley whose poem “Dear Skull” won the 2015 Loraine Williams Poetry Prize and is featured as the first work in the issue. Editor Stephen Corey’s “To Our Readers” takes a fun trouncing on the form when he declares: “I hearby announce the invention and likely demise of the ‘braided editorial,’ an offshoot from the ‘braided essay’ that has been rather de rigueur in recent years in some literary circles – to such an extent that people teach how-to classes, and anthologies of such works are probably imminent.” Also worth note: William Walsh’s interview with and inclusion of several poems by Rita Dove. And this among so much else to recommend.

New England Review v37 n1 includes a literary criticism section entitled The Mind at the End of the Palm: Wallace Stevens Thinking. In a series of five essays, “five poet-critics consider Wallace Stevens, with a focus on Stevens as a ‘philosophical’ poet (or not). The first four were presented as a symposium at the AWP Conference in 2014 [by David Baker, Linda Gregerson, Carl Phillips, Stanley Plumly], then gathered by David Baker and edited for print; the final essay, by Carol Frost, came to NER serendipitously, at about the same time. They all look closely at Stevens’s poetry and why it continues to engage us so deeply, more than a hundred years after he published his first poems.” Baker’s contribution can be read on the NER website here.

The newest issue of The Bitter Oleander: A Magazine of Contemporary International Poetry & Short Fiction (v22 n1) features an interview with comtemporary Greek writer Dimitris Lyacos as well as a seletion of his poems from his Poena Damni triology, translated by Shorsha Sullivan. An excerpt from his interview with TBO’s editor and a selection from his featured work can be read on The Bitter Oleander’s webite here.

MĀNOA publishes two volumes a year of contemporary writing, often the first time in translation, from throughout Asia, the Pacific, and the Americas. Past volumes have featured new work from such places as the People’s Republic of China, Tibet, Nepal, Taiwan, Japan, Korea, Okinawa, Viet Nam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, New Zealand, Australia, Cambodia, French Polynesia, the Pacific Islands, India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, as well as Canada, Mexico, and South America. The two most recent issues of MĀNOA are Story Is a Vagabond: Fiction, Essays, and Drama by Intizar Husain and The Colors of Dawn: Twentieth Centruy Korean Poetry. Husain, considered one of the greatest writers in Urdu, passed away at the beginning of the year in Lahore, Pakistan. His volume published just early in 2015 provides a fitting tribute to his impact on the literature of his culture.

The newest issue of The Wallace Stevens Journal (a publication of the Wallace Stevens Society) is themed: Wallace Stevens and Walt Whitman. Society Vice President Glen Macleod writes in his introductory essay: “When I first proposed an MLA roundtable discussion on Walt Whitman and Wallace Stevens, it seemed like a natural pairing. . . A panel on this topic might prompt some fresh perspectives on a well-established case of literary influence. The topic turned out to be more interesting and more controversial than I anticipated.”

Macleod introduces each of the following essays, excerpts of which can be read on the publication’s Project Muse page:

“A Prefatory Note on Whitman, Stevens, and the Poetics of Americana” by Tyler Hoffman
“Between Surface and Influence: Stevens, Whitman, and the Problem of Mediation” by Patrick Redding
“Whitman and Stevens: No Supreme Fiction” by Matt Miller
“Beach Boys: Stevens, Whitman, and Franco-American Modernism” by Lee M. Jenkins
“Whitman and Stevens: Certain Phenomena of Sound” by Roger Gilbert
And a questionnaire – in which Macleod and Journal Editor Bart Eeckhout ask Tony Sharpe of Lancaster University questions about Whitman and Stevens in the United Kingdom.

Guest edited by Bill Kartalopoulos, “International Comics” is the theme of the March-April 2016 issue of World Literature Today. Editor for the Best American Comics series, Kartalopoulos also teaches comics history and the graphic novel at Parsons The New School for Design and the School of Visual Arts. Along with his introduction, the magazine features an interview with artist David B. (B. is short for Beauchard), “Baby Boom (excerpts)” comics by Yūichi Yokoyama, and essays “Casting Shadows: Anke Feuchtenberger’s Comics and Graphic Narration” by Elizabeth Nijdam, “Frémok: Comics Out-of-Bounds” by Erwin Dejasse, “International Comics: Five Groundbreaking Publishers,” “Six Comic Books For Further Reading,”  and “Ilan Manouach: Defamiliarizing Comics” all by Bill Kartalopoulos.

BANG! is a monthly author online showcase published by The New Guard. Three pieces in any combination of previously unpublished poetry shorts or fiction or nonfiction are featured online for a month. Submission period runs all year round with the next installment planned for April 4, 2016. The March 2016 BANG! author is Lyall Harris. Past authors have included Alexandra Oliver, Mike Heppner, Marc Mewshaw, Timothy Dyke, Marcia Popp, Quenton Baker, Joshua Graber, Charles Wyatt, Julio Duggan, Jonathan Segol, Lissa Kiernan, Roger Bonair-Agard, James Kimbrell, Bridget Boland, E.G. Cunningham, Melissa Goode, Mark Wagstaff, Carla Stern, Sarah Glass, Jennifer Amell, Zakia R. Khwaja, Julie Poitras Santos and Amy Nash.

Vine Leaves Literary Journal, featuring “the lost writing form of the vignette,” is accepting applications for Editor-in-Chief to manage the biannual print  and digital publication as well as develop a clear vision for its literary and financial stability. Qualifications include a creative self-starter with a minimum two years managerial and editorial experience; a voracious and diverse reader with extensive literary and design networks, excellent communications skills, and a relentless passion for supporting aspiring writers; ideally, an author yourself. This is a part-time, renewable, three-year contract, beginning late June 2016 reporting to Publisher Jessica Bell. This is a volunteer position until the Journal becomes profitable, when a reasonable salary will be negotiated. Applications close Friday, April 29, 2016 with Skype interviews late May/early June. Full posting here.

Arcadia 10.1 is themed “The New Chican@” with guest editor Ito Romo. The issue features short fiction by Luke Neftalí Villafranca, poetry by Octavio Quintanilla, fiction and nonfiction by Sarah Cortez, and a poem by Tim Z. Hernandezm, with original art from Vincent Valdez. Romo writes in his introduction, “I wanted to put together a group of artists who, with their art, be it visual or literary, tell a story honestly and beautifully – those were my only criteria. And so, I’ve chosen a group of Mexican American artists who have recreated for us, with images and words, the current strange and dark malaise of the invisible, of the forgotten.”

For Rattle #51, the editors put out the call for submissions from women poets with the same great uncertaintly every magazine risks when planning a themed issue or special feature. Rattle editors must have been pleased, as the issue features “a lengthy tribute to 31 feminist poets” selected from “the thousands of poems” submitted. Also included in the issue is a conversation with Maggie Nelson, author of The Argonauts. The feature explores the question, “What does it mean to be a feminist poet in the 21st century?” Rattle editors surmise: “There might be as many answers to that question as there are feminist poets—each of those featured provide their perspectives in an especially important contributor notes section.”

Featured poets: Lisa Baird, Michele Battiste, Roberta Beary, Heather Bell, Claire Blotter, Leila Chatti, Ann Clark, Barbara Crooker, Denise Duhamel & Maureen Seaton, Julie R. Enszer, Alexis Pauline Gumbs, Beth Gylys, Kelsey Hagarman, Sandra Kohler, Amy Miller, Abby E. Murray, Jenny Qi, Jessy Randall, Laura Read, Lucinda Roy, Yaccaira Salvatierra, Amber Shockley, Robin Silbergleid, Julie Steiner, Lisa Summe, Katherine Barrett Swett, Kelly Grace Thomas, Amy Uyematsu, Julie Marie Wade, and Sara Watson.

The inaugural issue of the revived Courtship of the Winds features a Digital Forum in which the editor asks five questions related to education reform, including “What does it mean to be well-educated?” and “Which educational systems in the U.S. or in other countries would you point to as a model for reform efforts here? What has made them successful?”

Editor William V. Ray engaged a variety of professionals in the conversation, and while based in Massachusetts, the topic is pertinent nation wide. Participants include: Rachael Avery Barton, Middle School History Teacher; Michael Capuano, U.S. Representative for Massachusetts’ 7th District; Kenneth Hawes, Senior Lecturer in Education, Wellesley College; Phillip James, History Department Coordinator, Lincoln-Sudbury R.H.S.; Véronique Latimer, High School Art Teacher; Arthur Unobskey, Assistant Superintendent, Gloucester Public Schools; Isa Zimmerman, Executive Director, Massachusetts Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

The Courtship of Winds publishes two online issues per year of poetry, fiction, short dramatic pieces, essays, photography, art, and short pieces of music.

Since 2009, Verse has been dedicated to publishing a collection of works from each selected contributor. Readers who enjoy spending more time with one author will appreciate this format; the most recent issue offers nearly 450 pages to only 14 portfolios by Natalie Eilbert, Sandra Simonds, Timothy Liu, Eric Pankey, Karla Kelsey, Leonard Schwartz, Kate Colby, John High, Kathryn Cowles, Douglas Piccinnini, Laressa Dickey, B.J. Soloy, Aleah Sterman Goldin, and Kevin Varrone. Verse is housed in the English Department at the University of Richmond, with Faculty Editor Brian Henry’s ENG 393 students involved in the editorial process.

World Literature Today January/February 2016 features a celebration of the NSK Neustadt Prize Laureate Meshack Asare. Since 2003, the NSK Neustadt Prize for Children’s Literature has been awarded every other year to a living writer or author-illustrator with significant achievement in children’s or young-adult literature. Laureates receive a check for $25,000, a silver medallion, and a certificate at a public ceremony at the University of Oklahoma and are featured in a subsequent issue of World Literature Today. Other recipients of the NSK Prize have included Mildred D. Taylor (2003), Brian Doyle (2005), Katherine Paterson (2007), Vera B. Williams (2009), Virginia Euwer Wolff (2011), and Naomi Shihab Nye (2013). [Text from the NSK Neustadt Prize website.]

Glimmer Train Bulletins are a free monthly resource with “essays by creative-writing teachers and other accomplished authors on craft, perspective, and the particulars of writing and getting published.” I enjoy reading these brief but poignant commentaries on the writing life. Here’s the lead lines for February’s Bulletin #109 – see for yourself if you aren’t intrigued to read at least one of these:

Gabe Herron: You have to forget time because it’s going to take how long it takes, not one minute longer, not one minute less.
Carrie Brown: I’m interested in how shockingly difficult it is to be good. And I’m interested in our failures in that regard—exactly how we fail and why, how we console ourselves and others, how we forgive ourselves and others, how we fail to forgive.
Stephanie Soileau [pictured]: I believe in storytelling as a way to map and explore the ambiguities of human experience, and it is this belief that motivates me as a fiction writer. Stories have given me a language to express the contradictions in my own experience, and because…
George Rabasa: The fragrant mess is being constantly stirred, the recipe changing, if not hour by hour, certainly from one week to the next: memory agitates, imagination warps, new stuff is learned and enters the mixture.

World Literature Today celebrates 90 years of continuous publication with its January/February 2016 issue. Editor Daniel Simon [pictured] writes: “To celebrate. . . I’m pleased to announce the 2016 Puterbaugh Essay Series, a yearlong suite of review-essays that survey the twenty-first-century literary landscape. The editors have invited five writers to reflect on the contemporary scene by choosing a book or group of books, published since 2010, that have inspired their own creative and critical thinking. Bangladeshi novelist and critic K. Anis Ahmed launches the series with “Fiction: A Transgressive Art,” a compelling essay that, among other topics, focuses on the insidious forms of censorship that contemporary writers tend to internalize. Subsequent issues will include essays by Ghassan Zaqtan (Palestine), Bernice Chauly (Malaysia), Dubravka Ugrešić (former Yugoslavia), and Porochista Khakpour (Iran/US).” A good reason to start a subscription to WLT today!

Issue 1 of Indiana Review Online: An Undergraduate Project is now available. The editors write that IRO was started “to give voice to writers we don’t often see in literary journals. In the hyper-competitive world of literary publishing, emerging, undergraduate writers do not always have the opportunity to gain their first footholds. We wanted to help change that.” And indeed they have, receiving hundreds of submission from around the world, the first issue was whittled down to top picks in poetry and fiction. Featured writers include Amzie Augusta Dunekacke, Ellen Goff, Katie Harrs, Robert Julius, Tiwaladeoluwa Adekunle, W. S. Brewbaker, John M. Brown, Isabella Escalante, Kacey Fang, Shyanne Marquette, Carly Jo Olszewski, Meritt Rey Salathe, and Sage Yockelson.